SCRIBBLER: What will High Speed Rail do for Rossendale?

Undated handout photo issued by HS2 of the potential HS2 train design as the Government should appoint a special HS2 minister, says a report from the growth taskforce for the £50 billion high-speed rail project. PRESS ASSOCIATION Photo. Issue date: Friday March 21, 2014. The new minister would ensure growth and regeneration around HS2 remained a priority, the taskforce said. Led by Lord Deighton, the taskforce said the scale of HS2 was "without precedent" and "could catalyse far-reaching economic and social benefits, particularly to the cities of the Midlands and the North". The report went on: "So it is clear to us that we cannot expect to get the most out of HS2 simply by following 'business as usual'. See PA story RAIL HS2. Photo credit should read: HS2/PA Wire NOTE TO EDITORS: This handout photo may only be used in for editorial reporting purposes for the contemporaneous illustration of events, things or the people in the image or facts mentioned in the caption. Reuse of the picture may require further permission from the copyright holder.

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Last week, new calls were made for High Speed 3, a rail line which would connect Liverpool and Hull via Manchester and Leeds.

The argument is that the North’s economy would grow faster if you could move between cities faster.

It’s the same argument which has led to more than £70bn being allocated to building High Speed 2, which will first link London to Birmingham, and then move on to Manchester and Leeds.

Both schemes have former chancellor George Osborne behind them.

He is also behind the Northern Powerhouse scheme which aimed to accelerate economic growth in the North through investment and devolution of powers.

High Speed 3 was the main spine of his Northern Powerhouse vision, but given the current government has recently scrapped plans to electrify the line between Manchester and Leeds – which would have created a faster, more reliable train route – the likelihood of any real investment in the route seems unlikely.

Indeed, how seriously the current government under Theresa May takes the whole of the Northern Powerhouse is hotly debated in Westminster.

For Rossendale MP Jake Berry, the Northern Powerhouse is very much a thing the Government is committed to – after all, he is the Northern Powerhouse Minister.

What I don’t think is up for much debate is what either the Northern Powerhouse or indeed High Speed 3 will do to benefit areas like Rossendale.

Overall, it would appear not a lot.

The Northern Powerhouse is predicated on the notion of accelerating growth in cities in the North.

But nobody ever seems to address how that growth benefits areas like Rossendale, or indeed anywhere in Lancashire.

Sure, some people might commute in and out of these big cities to work, or maybe spend their spare time, but where’s the real benefit to Lancashire’s economy, or the prospects of young people who wish to grow up and remain in Lancashire?

At the moment, you can live on the outskirts of Leeds and still commute into central Manchester by public transport (train) within an hour.

If you want to try and commute from Rawtenstall to central Manchester during rush hour by bus, you’ll be lucky to do it within 80 minutes.

That’s not to knock the Witch Way bus service, just a fact that a combination of traffic congestion and poor transport links (ie rail services) let this area down.

Under the plans for HS3, you’d be able to get between Leeds and Manchester in 26 minutes.

I suspect if that ever happened, you’d still be looking at an hour between Manchester and Rawtenstall.

According to the 2011 census, around 1,500 people commute to Manchester from Rossendale every day, and a further 2,000 from Rossendale to Bury.

By contrast, around 700 people commuter from Leeds to Manchester every day, and 530 the other way.

The transport and economic priority shouldn’t be connecting big cities to each other, but areas like Rossendale to their nearest cities.

And what of the 10,683 people who live in Rossendale and also work here?

How does constantly investing in cities and dreaming up fantasy train tracks make a difference to them?

The answer, I fear, is blindingly obvious.

I’ll be honest, I’m not really a gravy person.

On a Sunday roast, for sure, and maybe on chips, but only if they are from the chippy.

The idea of wrestling in gravy has never really grabbed me as something for the bucket list, but I’m glad it has for others because I love the pictures and video which emerge from Stacksteads after the annual gravy wrestling championships held there .

It’s one of those quirky events which helps puts an area on the map – one of those events which people may have heard of when you tell them where you live.

The annual World Gravy Wrestly Championships at the Rose N Bowl pub on Newchurch Road in Bacup.

People travel from across the country to take part.

Where else will you find a competition where someone dons the moniker ‘Connor McGravy’ with a smile on their face?

We need more events like this.

Thank goodness the Ramsbottom black pudding chucking competition is but a couple of weeks away!

In an interview with BBC Radio Lancashire during his visit to Rossendale, Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn said he didn’t feel the Tory administration running Lancashire county council was ‘effective.’

Given they’ve only had the keys to County Hall back in their grasp since May, it seems a little soon to pass judgement – and indeed it’s a comment which rather ignores the fact this area voted in Tory councillors ahead of Labour ones just a few months ago.

That was presumably news to those who fought to keep Helmshore Textile Museum open, as well as local libraries, and indeed those who fought to keep threatened subsidised bus routes going.

And in fairness to the Tories running the county council, they have delivered on their promise to re-open libraries and are pushing to reverse other cuts too.

Jeremy Corbyn visit to The Whitaker museum in Rawtenstall.

Quite how this all stacks up financially in future budgets has yet to be revealed, but it seems a bit soon to be dismissing a three-month old administration as ineffective so soon after the electorate decided a change was needed.